WordPress vs. Drupal
Fri, 07/10/2009 - 10:43pm
I'm thinking about taking the plunge into Drupal. I've been using WordPress for a couple years now and recently started creating custom themes for WordPress. How is Drupal simlar to WordPress, and how is it different?
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 1:14pm
#2
Re: WordPress vs. Drupal
Thank you. I really like your analogy. My friends and I used to be into BMXing (I wasn't too good at it, but we have some good footage of me wrecking a lot).
I just found out Friday that I'm losing my job, because of the economy and some poor business choices admittedly made by the owner. It could happen as early as August 1st or as late as September 1st. I view this as an opportunity to move my family closer to my wife's hometown, but I also am worried about finding work. I'm currently in the process of updating my resume. Thankfully, we have friends who have offered to let us live with them during this time of unkowingness. My wife will be able to transfer her job, which is really nice. Any prayers you guys can offer up will be greatly appreciated.
This may give me more time to play around with Drupal as well. Please continue the discussion about the differences between Drupal and WordPress. I can use all the inspiration I can get.
Sun, 07/12/2009 - 8:36pm
#3
Just wondering - what are
Just wondering - what are your specialties, specifically - do you do more PHP? More design work? These kind of things can be very helpful for diving into the Drupal-sphere.
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 1:15pm
#4
My Skills Index
To answer your question, I've always been more on the design side of things, but am transitioning to a happy ballence between design and development. Here are some of my skills that I list in my professional résumé:
Skills:
● Vector artwork Creation and Recreation from Raster Images
● Print Production
● Image and Logo Design
● Managing and Updating Websites
● HTML and some CSS
● Custom Theme Creation for WordPress and Drupal
● Digital Multimedia Technology
● Marketing Planning
● Banner advertising & Creation
● Project management
● Customer Service
● E-mail Consulting
● Software Proficiency:
Illustrator, PhotoShop, In-design, Director, Quark Express/PageMaker, FrontPage/Nvu,
Microsoft Suite/OpenOffice, Pinacle Studio/VideoWave, WinZip/StuffIt (file compression)
● Web 2.0 Event Planning
If anyone is interested in a PDF version of my résumé, please contact me.
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 1:55am
#5
Original purpose
Hi Cade_One,
I agree with oscatholic's anaology. As someone who's used both WordPress and Drupal, I've another thought to add.
WordPress is a blogging platform that has expanded its scope. Drupal is a general purpose platform that has a blog module.
For my blog and for fairly simple websites (where posts/pages constitute most of the content), I tend to prefer Wordpress. Conversely, I wouldn't want to bother with Drupal for a simple blog or basic site. But for more complex sites, Drupal has a lot more power and potential (even though that comes with a different learning curve).
Regarding themes specifically, I've done a little bit of theme development in both. I'd say that it's pretty similar (PHP/HTML/CSS), but Drupal's system is much more modular (though, maybe I just haven't played with enough Wordpress plugins).
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 2:02am
#6
Out of the box, WordPress has
Out of the box, WordPress has tons and tons of themes, many are free, and many are beautiful and inexpensive. Drupal definitely lags in that area... but Drupal, because of it's modular nature (which ballyne mentions), is not as easily themeable for a general audience (almost every Drupal site is unique, unlike most blogs, which have one type of posting, and one author, without any other frills).
But there are some movements that are making progress in this area, such as 3rd World Themes, and the design for Drupal initiative.
But as a general rule, Drupal sites take a little more time initially to build out and get ready, and blogging, while not an afterthought (this site is basically a community blog site), is definitely not the number one purpose of Drupal.
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 9:32am
#7
Don't forget about Joomla!
Joomla is between WordPress and Drupal in terms of ease of use.
The next version (1.6 scheduled for release this year I believe) will expand the ACL options and there's development on a new CCK similar to Drupal.
The 3rd party themes, extensions market is huge as well.
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 10:05am
#8
@catholicservant - quite
@catholicservant - quite true, quite true. I haven't had a use case specific for Joomla yet, though, and since I started with Drupal, I don't know if I'll ever be tempted to switch to Joomla ;-)
They're very similar, but for my needs Drupal is a better fit. Joomla, in my mind, is best for simpler sites where community / varied integrations aren't the number one priority (simple church sites, corporate sites, etc. seem ideal for Joomla).
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 9:32pm
#9
True for the most part...
I've only started digging into Drupal recently, but I know a couple of strengths have been...
- Pretty mature/stable code. It's been around for awhile and has great community support.
- A very flexible ACL...which leads to...
- It's greatest strength has been the 'networking' and 'community' style sites.
- A great Content Construction Kit.
In the past year, www.jomsocial.com has come along and provided Joomla with a very competitive and strong 'community' tool and version 1.6 of Joomla should provide a useful ACL. Also, K2 just came out a couple months ago with a very nice CCK.
The core developer team is pretty committed and since adoption and interest has skyrocketed the last couple years, they're making great strides in improving the product.
Personally, I believe the competition between Drupal and Joomla should benefit the users the most and it's very likely that the big 3, WordPress/Drupal/Joomla are going to be big CMS players for years to come. I think the biggest loser here are the 'closed-source' solutions. They've got to be losing market share like crazy.
Tue, 07/14/2009 - 10:56pm
#10
You make an important point
You make an important point about the 'closed source' solutions - I haven't spoken to one person interested in developing a Microsoft SharePoint site, or something of the like, using expensive and proprietary tools. I wonder if there's much of a market for these tools in places besides where companies like Microsoft already have a stranglehold on the IT departments.
But more and more, vender lock-in is becoming a thing of the past, and that's a good thing for everyone. It would be great if our content could truly be free, and be able to be ported from Drupal to Joomla to Wordpress to plain old XML and back, without a ton of hassle and database management skill. But we're not there yet!
Thu, 07/16/2009 - 8:21am
#11
Last month at the Catholic Media Convention
Last month at one of the luncheons, I sat next to an editor of a Catholic newspaper from Canada (don't remember which one) and they piggy-back on the Diocesan website.
The Diocese there has spent around 90K on a closed-source vendor solution...and they're not happy with it. OUCH!
I agree about porting content between these CMS solutions (Drupal/WP/Joomla). I've not had to do it yet, but I've seen a couple tutorials on it. Since they all employ MySql...there's possibilities there.
Last thing on the way vendor solutions have worked in the past. Over the years, I've seen a large number of successful website deployments by mid-sized org's that dropped quite a few $$$ into them. When they were launched, they looked nice and were for the most part pretty current in terms of navigation/layout. But after 2 years...things changed and they're stuck with a site that's showing it's age. I'm a firm believer in the site reboot every 2-3 years...but to do that you really need to think through the architecture to put in place.
Mon, 07/20/2009 - 3:27pm
#12
Has anyone tried the
Has anyone tried the WordPress Integration with Joomla? Is it worth $90?
Fri, 08/14/2009 - 1:43pm
#13
Found a review on it...
Matt,
Someone reviewed the corephp WordPress integration extension...
http://www.joomlapraise.com/joomla-reviews/wordpress-mu-for-joomla-from-...
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 1:31pm
#14
@catholicservant I think
@catholicservant I think unfortunately most diocese do not have the IT people who know or like open source solutions. If it doesn't cost and arm and a leg that its full of security holes, ect...
Mon, 07/20/2009 - 5:02pm
#15
Yeah...I know...
and the result is usually the same. Big $$$ for a vendor solution that is out of date in 1 year.
IMHO...the only real solution is for the orgs to suck it up, and hire a good developer/designer (not a friend of the family which happens too often...or trying to train someone in-house who kinda/sorta knows FrontPage 2000 and Outlook).
Sorry for the cynicism. I've been doing this for awhile and have seen too many internal obstacles to winning long-term communication strategies.
It is changing for the better though...just more slowly than I'd hoped.
Mon, 07/20/2009 - 5:09pm
#16
RE: WordPress/Joomla Integration
@Matt_K
I think I saw some 3rd party component a couple weeks ago that purported to provide some level of integration. Was it this - www.corephp.com/wordpress/wordpress-integration-for-joomla-1.5.html ?
I gave it a cursory review (didn't install though) and it looks a bit green, still needs to mature. My 'guess' is that it may not deliver the goods out of the box.
My general take on these kinds of 3rd party tools is this..
1. If they have a demo, give it a shot on a dev site.
2. If it's a commercial extension and costs more than say $25, they should offer a money-back guarantee. My experience with most of these developers has been very good in this department. Word of mouth is pretty huge in the Joomla community.
3. Look over their forums/boards for any red flags (complaints).
HTH,
Craig
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 1:31pm
#17
@catholicservant *sigh of
@catholicservant *sigh of relief* Ok, Glad I joined the right discussion! It can be quite frustrating when a few good technical people at the diocese can make all the difference. Why have a staff of 50 people at a diocese who have no technical resources to spread the Good News, except the kid brother with FrontPage on Win ME. A diocesean newspaper that is not online seems so behind the times. I have several diocesean employees who ask me to put together a website for their department or project - pro bono of course - because there is no one employed to help them.
So how do we overcome the good ol boy culture in diocesean staffing to get the right people in where they can do the most good?
PS> Thanks for the tips
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 1:31pm
#18
@Matt_K - well, welcome to my
@Matt_K - well, welcome to my world ;-)
If only the Archdioceses could clone us (and those like us), and our clones would work for free!
The thing is, a lot of people who work in the different Archdioceses don't see a huge importance to having a good online presence, so they won't devote much (if any) resources to these kinds of things :-(
Tue, 07/21/2009 - 4:12pm
#19
More thoughts about this...
IMHO...I think it has to come down from the top...Bishops/Archbishops/Clergy. As they become more aware that the young'er' flock are getting fed online by junk food...they'll drive the initiatives. And I think this is where change is/has been happening, albeit slowly.
If you can ever get the Paulist Father from BustedHalo.com (can't remember his name) to speak to your Diocesan movers/shakers...that'll get things moving to.
He gave a conference presentation at DISC (National Diocesan IT Staff) a few years back that was awesome! He presented the cold hard facts about youth falling away from the Church and provided ideas and ways to engage them.
Mon, 07/27/2009 - 7:35pm
#20
It would seem that slowly but
It would seem that slowly but surely the Catholic world is delving into the interwebs.
As a Joomla fan(n00b) at the moment I've taken to redeveloping the old Catholicweb type websites in my diocese to that of Joomla!
As a stepping stone it's an effective one I think. I'm finishing up (and still expanding) the site for my youthgroup and preparing to work on the college organization website and may get to actually assist in the redo of the Diocese level websites!
Since Joomla! has so many themes, modules, and general expansions it's easy to just change up some graphics rearrange a couple DIV's here and there and have a nice website that fits the needs.
I am contributing to the development of my Diocese's online presence. :D
I'm hoping that as Joomla! evolves these websites will be able to simply evolve with it and continue to grow and expand.
And hopefully this will begin a general expansion of the youth based organizations here in the South Plains area at least.
Gotta start somewhere. :D
Thu, 08/06/2009 - 1:06am
#21
I'm like that kid brother they get...
:) ...meaning I'm on my own for our youth ministry website and now our parish's, without enough training.
I used to handcode in the old days with HTML and now have quickly put together a site on Dreamweaver and have continued updating with DW. I've also ventured into Wordpress with our blog, but a professional web designer friend says I should move the whole site to Wordpress, but I'm not as comfortable with that. I'm willing to learn, however, and have been browsing plugins that could work for what we're needing.
Any easy-to-use themes anyone here would recommend for a site that would be heavy with multimedia & (hopefully) interactivity?
Thanks, Deborah
Thu, 08/06/2009 - 6:45am
#22
Best Free WordPress Themes
Deb
It's kinda crazy how many WordPress themes are out there. For whatever reason, the best graphics designers chose/choose WP as the platform of choice. Drupal and Joomla are catching up though.
You can google for free WordPress themes...which I just did and found a pretty decent roundup..
http://wphacks.com/50-best-free-wordpress-themes-gallery/
Happy Theming
Fri, 08/28/2009 - 9:36am
#23
An unbiased comparison
For an unbiased comparison, I recommend reading Comparing Open Source Content Management Systems: WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, and Plone, by IdealWare. Our company used this to help guide us toward the right tool for our websites (which ended up being Drupal). It's an excellent guide.
Interestingly, I just took the plunge on a small site in WordPress (after having not touched it for over two years), so I think I can offer a little assistance with your question.
Where WordPress, I think, tips the balances towards ease of use and good looks over functionality and easy adaptability/flexibility in managing data (text, photos, videos, etc.), Drupal goes the other way.
A good analogy is this: Drupal is like going to the bike shop and purchasing a frame. Then you look around, find the wheels you want, a pannier for holding the types of thing you carry around, the fork, brakes, etc. that are finely tuned for your style of riding, then all the whiz-bang features you need. Wordpress is like going to Wal-Mart and grabbing the $100 special bike off the rack. It's a heckuva lot easier to pick up and ride, but in the long run, if you need a very flexible and expandable bike, it's not going to get you where you need to go.
In my mind, Wordpress is ideal for small community sites (where there might be one simple community blog, a few informational pages, and maybe a photo section or something), and small or large blogs (with the sole purpose of being a blog). Drupal is best when you're going to need something with lots of features, lots of different kinds of posts and data (CCK and Views are a godsend), and the possibility of having your website expand from single digits of users to hundreds of thousands (the stlouisreview.com website has over 75,000 unique users!).
For corporate type websites, I think it's a wash, and really depends on the specific needs of the corporation. If the corporation is going to only have one or a few people managing the website, and have a blog-style news section on their site, Wordpress might be good. If the company needs multiple users with multiple tiers of user access levels, or needs a lot of custom elements on the website, Drupal is a lot better suited for that.
Plus, with Drupal 7, a lot of focus is being put into usability and design... both WP and Drupal have very bright futures... I'm just worried Joomla might fall off the charts sooner or later. It seems stuck between WP/Drupal, without a very clear vision of its intended audience.
Advancing the faith.